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Exodus 29

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1 This is what you are to do to make them holy, to do the work of priests to me: Take one young ox and two male sheep, without any mark on them,

2 And unleavened bread, and unleavened cakes mixed with oil, and thin unleavened cakes on which oil has been put, made of the best bread-meal;

3 Put these in a basket and take them, with the ox and the two sheep.

4 And let Aaron and his sons come to the door of the Tent of meeting, and there let them be washed with water.

5 Take the robes, and put the coat and the dress and the ephod and the priest's bag on Aaron; put the band of needlework round him,

6 And let the head-dress be placed on his head and the holy crown on the head-dress.

7 Then take the oil and put it on his head.

8 And take his sons and put their robes on them;

9 And put the linen bands round Aaron and his sons, and the head-dresses on them, to make them priests by my order for ever: so you are to make Aaron and his sons holy to me.

10 Then let the ox be taken in front of the Tent of meeting: and let Aaron and his sons put their hands on its head.

11 And you are to put the ox to death before the Lord at the door of the Tent of meeting.

12 Then take some of the blood of the ox, and put it on the horns of the altar with your finger, draining out all the rest of the blood at the base of the altar.

13 And take all the fat covering the inside of the ox, and the fat joining the liver and the two kidneys with the fat round them, and let them be burned on the altar;

14 But the flesh of the ox and its skin and its waste parts are to be burned outside the circle of the tents, for it is a sin-offering.

15 Then take one of the sheep, and let Aaron and his sons put their hands on its head.

16 Then let it be put to death, so that the sides of the altar are marked with its blood.

17 Then the sheep is to be cut up into its parts, and after washing its legs and its inside parts, you are to put them with the parts and the head,

18 And let them all be burned on the altar as a burned offering to the Lord: a sweet smell, an offering made by fire to the Lord.

19 Then take the other sheep; and after Aaron and his sons have put their hands on its head,

20 You are to put the sheep to death, and take some of its blood and put it on the point of Aaron's right ear, and of the right ears of his sons, and on the thumbs of their right hands and the great toes of their right feet, dropping the rest of the blood on the sides of the altar.

21 Then take some of the blood on the altar, and the oil, and put it on Aaron and his robes and on his sons and on their robes, so that he and his robes and his sons and their robes may be made holy.

22 Then take the fat of the sheep, the fat tail, the fat covering the insides, and the fat joining the liver and the two kidneys with the fat round them, and the right leg; for by the offering of this sheep they are to be marked out as priests:

23 And take one bit of bread and one cake of oiled bread and one thin cake out of the basket of unleavened bread which is before the Lord:

24 And put them all on the hands of Aaron and of his sons, to be waved for a wave offering before the Lord.

25 Then take them from their hands, and let them be burned on the burned offering on the altar, a sweet smell before the Lord, an offering made by fire to the Lord.

26 Then take the breast of Aaron's sheep, waving it before the Lord; and it is to be your part of the offering.

27 So you are to make holy the breast of the sheep which is waved and the leg which is lifted up on high, that is, of the sheep which is offered for Aaron and his sons;

28 And it will be their part as a right for ever from the children of Israel, it is a special offering from the children of Israel, made from their peace-offerings, a special offering lifted up to the Lord.

29 And Aaron's holy robes will be used by his sons after him; they will put them on when they are made priests.

30 For seven days the son who becomes priest in his place will put them on when he comes into the Tent of meeting to do the work of the holy place.

31 Then take the sheep of the wave offering and let its flesh be cooked in water in a holy place.

32 And let Aaron and his sons make a meal of it, with the bread in the basket, at the door of the Tent of meeting.

33 All those things which were used as offerings to take away sin, and to make them holy to be priests, they may have for food: but no one who is not a priest may have them, for they are holy food.

34 And if any of the flesh of the offering or of the bread is over till the morning, let it be burned with fire; it is not to be used for food, for it is holy.

35 All these things you are to do to Aaron and his sons as I have given you orders: for seven days the work of making them priests is to go on.

36 Every day an ox is to be offered as a sin-offering, to take away sins: and by this offering on it, you will make the altar clean from sin; and you are to put oil on it and make it holy.

37 For seven days you are to make offerings for the altar and make it holy, so that it may become completely holy, and anything touching it will become holy.

38 Now this is the offering which you are to make on the altar: two lambs in their first year, every day regularly.

39 One lamb is to be offered in the morning and the other in the evening:

40 And with the one lamb, a tenth part of an ephah of the best meal, mixed with a fourth part of a hin of clear oil; and the fourth part of a hin of wine for a drink offering.

41 And the other lamb is to be offered in the evening, and with it the same meal offering and drink offering, for a sweet smell, an offering made by fire to the Lord.

42 This is to be a regular burned offering made from generation to generation, at the door of the Tent of meeting before the Lord, where I will come face to face with you and have talk with you.

43 There I will come face to face with the children of Israel, and the Tent will be made holy by my glory

44 I will make holy the Tent of meeting and the altar: and Aaron and his sons I will make holy, to be my priests

45 Among the children of Israel I will make my living-place, and I will be their God.

46 And they will see that I am the Lord their God, who took them out of the land of Egypt, so that I might be ever with them: I am the Lord their God.

   

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True Christianity # 706

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706. "The Lord's blood" means the divine truth that belongs to him and to the Word, because the spiritual meaning of his flesh is the divine goodness of his love; these two are united in the Lord.

It is well known that the Lord is the Word. There are two things to which all the details in the Word relate: divine goodness and divine truth. Therefore if we substitute "the Word" for "the Lord," it is clear that his flesh and blood mean divine goodness and divine truth.

There are many passages that establish that blood means the divine truth that belongs to the Lord or the Word. For example, his blood is called "the blood of the covenant," and a covenant means a partnership. It is by means of his divine truth that the Lord forges a partnership with us. See, for example, Zechariah: "By the blood of your covenant I will release the prisoners from the pit" (Zechariah 9:11). In Moses, "After Moses had read the book of the Law in the hearing of the people, he sprinkled half the blood upon the people and said, 'Behold, the blood of the covenant that Jehovah has forged with you through all these words'" (Exodus 24:3-8). "And Jesus took the cup and gave it to them and said, 'This is my blood of the new covenant'" (Matthew 26:27-28; Mark 14:24; Luke 22:20).

[2] The "blood of the new covenant" or "testament" means the Word, which is called a Covenant and a Testament, both the Old and the New; therefore it means the divine truth that is there. Because blood has this meaning, the Lord gave his disciples wine and said, "This is my blood" [Matthew 26:28; Mark 14:24]; wine means divine truth. Therefore wine is also called "the blood of grapes" (Genesis 49:11; Deuteronomy 32:14).

The Lord's words make this clearer still:

Truly, truly I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Humankind and drink his blood, you will not have life within you. My flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood live in me and I in them. (John 6:50-58)

Blood here means the divine truth of the Word, as is very clear because it says that those who drink it have life within them and live in the Lord and he lives in them. As people within the church are capable of knowing, divine truth and a life according to it are what allow the Lord to be in us and us in the Lord; the Holy Supper strengthens these effects.

[3] Since blood means the Lord's divine truth, which is also the divine truth of the Word, and this is the Old and New Covenant or Testament itself, therefore blood was the holiest symbolic substance in the church that existed among the children of Israel - a church whose every detail was a correspondence of something earthly with something spiritual. For example, they took the blood of the Passover lamb and put it on the doorposts and the lintel of their houses, to keep the plague from coming upon them (Exodus 12:7, 13, 22). The blood of the burnt offering was sprinkled on the altar, on its base, and on Aaron and his sons and on their garments (Exodus 29:12, 16, 20-21; Leviticus 1:5, 11, 15; 3:2, 8, 13; 4:25, 30, 34; 8:15, 24; 17:6; Numbers 18:17; Deuteronomy 12:27). Blood was also sprinkled in front of the veil that was before the ark, on the mercy seat there, and on the horns of the altar of incense (Leviticus 4:6-7, 17-18; ).

The "blood of the Lamb" mentioned in the Book of Revelation has the same meaning: "They washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb" (Revelation 7:14). So does the following statement in the same book: "War broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and conquered it by the blood of the Lamb and by the Word of their testimony" (Revelation 12:7, 11).

[4] There is no basis for thinking that Michael and his angels were able to conquer the dragon through anything other than the Lord's divine truth in the Word.

The angels in heaven are unable to think about any blood or about the Lord's suffering; they think instead about the divine truth and about his resurrection. When we think about the Lord's blood, angels think instead about the divine truth of the Lord's Word; when we think about the Lord's suffering, they think instead about the Lord's glorification, focusing exclusively on his resurrection. A great deal of experience has allowed me to know that this is the case.

[5] The fact that blood means divine truth is also clear from the following statements in David: "God will save the souls of the needy; their blood will be precious in his sight. And they will live; and he will give them some of the gold of Sheba" (Psalms 72:13-15). The blood that is precious in the sight of God stands for the divine truth that is among the people [meant by "the needy"]; the gold of Sheba is the wisdom they develop as a result.

In Ezekiel: "Gather yourselves to a great sacrificial meal on the mountains of Israel, so that you will eat flesh and drink blood. You will drink the blood of the leaders of the earth, and drink blood until you are drunk. This is how I will present my glory among the nations" (Ezekiel 39:17-21). This passage deals with the church that the Lord is going to establish among the nations. (On the point that the word "blood" here cannot mean blood, but must mean the truth from the Word that exists among them, see just above [705].)

  
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Thanks to the Swedenborg Foundation for the permission to use this translation.